Well done anne! Great to see you back into it, it has been a while 
And what would we do without Jader 
Will regard to lighting, I generally use about 5-6 lights for studio style (No walls/roofing).
I find that distant lights are very affective for “Studio” style renders, but they can be problematic in scenes where there are walls and roofing as they become an obstacle. Of my average lights, 3-4 will be varied angles aimed at the figure from the front. 1 of those front ones will be more brighter than the others, and will serve as the main light. The second will be subtle to help neutralize some more extreme shadows. The other two will be used to balance the lighting. I use the 5th-6th lights as back lights. One subtle the other quite bright as to light up the edge of the figure. Uber environments are also useful for studio renders, their like a global light, I use one with subtle strength to help simulate light bouncing of the environment (Evens things subtly).
Spot lights are either used for the spot light effect, or a torch, or lamp etc… Or they can be used in render scenes such as interiors like a lounge room or dining room. They are very affective interior lights for full scenes. Most of my set lights in my News7 renders were spotlights.
Linea point lights (LPL) are the BEST light to make the most out of character texture details. I prefer linea point lights over point lights as they have full control over the affect the light has over the scene. Very useful for full scene renders For subtle character lighting to assist other lights in illuminating the character effectively, I generally use 4-6 LPL’s all very much subtle. (In news7 project, I used about 5 of them to light up the characters)
Just some of what I’ve learned. I’m looking forward to Jaders tut
